Birthday
by Chibionna
Summary: After Sakura rejects him, Naruto gets a gift from Hinata


Birthday

Hinata stood behind one of the many trees that littered the area in front of the bridge. Her fingers poked each other in a nervous habit as she tried to gather the courage she needed. 'You are one of Konoha's many shinobi, you should be able to do this!', she tried to reason with herself. She knelt down briefly to pick up the package she had placed on the forest floor and after taking a shaky breath, she peeked around the tree to watch for a moment she where could intervene. Her cheeks darkened to a dusty pink as her eyes spotted the loud blonde ninja, Naruto, that she had feelings for since their academy days. With him stood her other classmates from the academy, Sakura-san, Sasuke-san, and their jounin instructor, Kakashi-sensei.

"Alright, we're done for today." Kakashi stated in a bored tone from behind his book. "We'll meet here at the same time tomorrow." He muttered.

"You mean we should be here a couple of hours after the appointed time?" Naruto snorted, knowing their sensei never came at the time he selected and always came up with an off-the-wall excuse when he showed up.

Kakashi smiled pleasantly from behind his mask, "No Naruto. I mean be here on time or you will face the consequences, remember I know where you live." He stated jauntily before disappearing in a puff of smoke.

Sakura smiled at the interaction between the two, but also heeded the warning her sensei issued them. He would not hesitate to unpleasantly, or in Kakashi's place pleasantly, retrieve from their houses. For now she would store that information away, she had another matter at hand. She pushed a pink strand of hair behind her ear as she turned toward Sasuke. Now was her chance, maybe today he would say yes! "Sasuke-kun." She called softly, her green eyes widening as the dark haired teen actually turned to acknowledge her. She almost lost her nerve as his ebony eyes bore into her. "D-do you want to get something to eat?"

"No." Sasuke answered dispassionately as he turned to walk away.

"We can go someplace quick; I know how important your training is to you. Besides, you must be hungry after the training we just did today." She said hastily before he walked away.

Sasuke looked back over his shoulder, "No. I have better things to do with my precious time other than to spend it with you, gallivanting around the village. It would be wasted that way." With that, he continued on his way.

Sakura wilted. He was always so cold. She sighed softly as she thought to herself that tomorrow would be better.

"Its okay, Sakura-chan! You can go out to get ramen with me!" Spouted the bubbly blonde behind her cheerfully as he grinned, leaning on the banister.

Sakura turned with a disinterested look on her face, "No, Naruto." She said with a hint of annoyance in her tone. "And could you _please_ stop asking me that every single day? We're just friends, Naruto. _Friends._" She turned and walked the same direction as Sasuke.

Naruto frowned, hurt that Sakura would never see him as anything more than a friend when she hung all over that jerk who practically ignored her. His frown was quickly replaced with that well rehearsed smile that hid all of his daily pain and sorrows the villagers threw at him for being unfortunate enough for having a demon sealed in him. He put his hands behind his head and prepared to follow his teammates when he heard his name called in a soft voice. He glanced over his shoulder and a flicker of surprise crossed his cerulean eyes before he turned toward the person. "Hinata! How are you?" He smiled widely at her, genuinely wanting to know how she was.

"O-okay." The small girl stuttered. Her blue head bowed slightly and her pearlescent eyes staring at the package in her hand. She closed her eyes tightly, gathering up her courage, and shoved the small wrapped box into Naruto's chest.

"Hmm? What's this?" Naruto wondered out loud. He took the offered box gingerly from the girl's fingers. "Is this for me?" He asked tilting his head slightly to the side.

Hinata nodded, her eyes still downcast.

The blonde looked bewildered momentarily before carefully stripping the box of its orange wrapping, reminiscent of the clothes he used to wear. He opened the box and pulled out a silver chain necklace with a medallion on it, baffled that anyone would give him anything. He closed the empty box and pushed it into his jacket pocket to examine the medallion closer. It was in the shape of a spiral. Naruto's finger traced the uprising metal of the spiral and he felt what were engraved characters on the back. He flipped over the medallion and his mouth fell open. On the back were the characters for Rokudaime, which he was aspiring to be. "Hinata…" He trailed off in awe.

"H-happy birthday, N-naruto-kun." She mumbled.

Naruto immediately lowered the necklace to look at her in astonishment. "How…how did you know?"

"Iruka-sensei." She muttered.

He understood, of course his old teacher from the academy would know. Naruto nodded, "Thank you so much, Hinata. I really like it." He said quietly, strange for him because he was always loud. He smiled softly, genuinely for the first time in what was probably years. "Hinata, do you want to go get some ramen with me?"

Hinata's head snapped up and she blushed at seeing the smile on Naruto's face before nodding slowly.

Naruto's smile widened into a grin as he gently took her small hand and pulled her along. This was the first time he had been happy in years and it was all because of this girl he had chosen to ignore because he was afraid of hurting her. Naruto glanced at Hinata affectionately, thinking to himself that he would not ignore her anymore.


End file.
